California's Highway 91 applied for a TIFIA loan. Will the T in TIFIA stand for "toll road?" Photo: Greater Riverside Chamber

TIFIA is a popular program, receiving $14 billion in loan requests despite only being able to loan about $1 billion in total this year. And under current law, the extent to which the project “helps maintain or protect the environment” makes up 20 percent of a project’s evaluation. In the EPW bill, the program is expanded by a factor of nine, but most evaluation criteria — including environmental protection — are omitted.

As Matt Sledge wrote in the Huffington Post:

Phineas Baxandall, a senior analyst at U.S. PIRG, said he thinks [EPW Chair Senator Barbara] Boxer may have cut a bad deal. He argues that doing away with TIFIA’s selection criteria means the U.S. Department of Transportation will be forced to give money to any transportation project that meets bare-bones financial eligibility requirements [...] Toll roads, backed by private investors looking to make a buck off of “public-private partnerships,” will be first in line, he argued, since they have plans that are “just ready to go off the shelf.” [...]

Los Angeles hopes it will get some of that TIFIA money. Not so fast, Baxandall said. “Places like Atlanta and L.A. are hoping that the new bounty of TIFIA will allow them to finance public transit expansions, but they are likely to find the money already claimed by private toll road projects in places like Florida and Texas.”

It’s hard not to see this as a huge step backwards, despite the funding increase. It wasn’t long ago that transit advocates were celebrating an end to the Bush-era’s “cost-effectiveness-above-all-else” rule in the Federal Transit Authority’s New Starts program. Now, Baxandall says, “at a time when the nation’s transportation system is starved for funds and there is a consensus that dollars need to be spent more wisely, it is outrageous that the one program that would be massively increased would no longer try to deliver the best bang for each buck.”

The good(-ish) news is that there’s still time to make changes to the bill. The Senate Banking Committee still has to work on a transit portion, the Senate Finance Committee still has to figure out how to come up with another $12 billion, the whole Senate still has to debate it all, and the House still has to do… anything.

Senate EPW Chair Barbara Boxer said this summer that bike-ped programs would be preserved in the transportation bill, but they have been severely weakened.

While the 600-page draft that came out of Senator Barbara Boxer’s committee includes some key reforms and increases funding for the TIFIA loan program, it also eviscerates successful and popular programs to make biking and walking safer.

Called “Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century” (MAP-21), the bill would streamline the existing eco-system of federal transportation programs. In addition, earmarks — set-asides for Congress members’ pet projects that have included famously wasteful items like the Bridge to Nowhere — would be eliminated once and for all.

But among the casualties are three key bike-ped programs: Transportation Enhancements, Safe Routes to School, and Recreational Trails. Those programs would be consolidated and listed as “eligible uses” under an $833 million subset of the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Program (CMAQ). That would represent a sharp drop from the $1.15 billion devoted to those programs in 2010. That year, Transportation Enhancements was funded at $878 million, Safe Routes to School at $183 million, and Recreational Trails as $85 million.

States could also divert their share of the $833 million to projects that add traffic lanes or don’t involve bike and pedestrian infrastructure at all. The bike-ped sub-category of CMAQ spending would be broadened to allow new road construction as an eligible use if the project “enhances connectivity and includes public transportation, pedestrian walkways or bicycle infrastructure.” Advocates are also concerned about a provision of the bill that allows states to opt out of using federal bike-ped funds altogether. The bill enables states that don’t use their bike-ped funding to spend it on other CMAQ projects instead.

The weakening of bike-ped programs is especially incongruous given the way Transportation Enhancements have withstood repeated GOP attacks this session. But EPW Chair Boxer has always made it a point to garner GOP support for this bill, and her counterpart on the committee, Oklahoma Republican James Inhofe, has been equally steadfast in opposing dedicated bike and pedestrian funding. Boxer had reassured advocates this summer that bike-ped programs would remain in the bill, but it seems they have been neutered in negotiations with Inhofe.

Meanwhile, MAP-21 does include some strong reform language in other areas. Earmarks would be eliminated by law — a tougher ban than the anti-earmark rule that currently exists. The bill also includes some measures intended to reduce bureaucratic hurdles and speed project delivery.

The bill would increase accountability for state DOTs and metropolitan planning organizations — the agencies that actually decide how to spend most federal surface transportation funding — by establishing performance measures that would track progress toward specific targets, instead of handing the states a blank check. In theory, such reforms could serve as a check on sprawl. Streetsblog is looking into how the performance-based funding system would function and will have more in a future post.

The bill would also boost support for the financing techniques that Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has pushed for under the banner of “America Fast Forward,” a concept that has enjoyed strong bi-partisan support. The new “Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Program” would expand the existing TIFIA loan program and allow states and cities to leverage revenue from local tax measures with federal financing to move projects forward faster. The bill would raise the maximum share of project costs funded through TIFIA from 33 to 49 percent and would reserve $1 billion in financing for the program annually, up from $300 million.

Noticeably absent is any provision for a national infrastructure bank. Instead the bill seeks to encourage state infrastructure banks, a position favored by House Republicans.

The EPW bill will be marked up in Boxer’s committee this Wednesday. Whatever emerges from the Senate will be drastically different than the House transportation bill, starting with the fact that GOP leadership in the House have pledged to pass a six-year bill, as opposed to the two-year bill put together by Boxer.

Sen. Barbara Boxer says dedicated funding for bike/ped projects is preserved, though Sen. Coburn appears satisfied that Transportation Enhancements is dead. Photo: AP

In exchange for releasing his stranglehold on the Senate (and the estimated 80,000 workers that could lose their jobs, at least temporarily, if the FAA bill lapsed) Coburn will get to insert his language into the long-term bill, when this latest extension expires.

According to CQ Today, Coburn said, “We’ve got an agreement that the next bill will be an opt-out for people on enhancements.” James Inhofe, the top Republican on the EPW committee which wrote the bill, “seems to have played a key role in brokering the deal,” CQ Today reports:

After the vote, Boxer quibbled with Coburn’s description of what will be in the next highway bill. Boxer said she and Inhofe had worked out “reforms” in the transportation enhancements section of the bill and met with Coburn to discuss them before the deal was worked out.

“We felt he would be pleased with the reforms,” she said. “It gives flexibility, without doing damage to the important programs in there.”

Boxer said Coburn made clear that he was “not going to vote for any more extensions” but allowed the current highway funding extension to move forward. “There’s not an opt-out,” she said. “You’ll see what we did. But no, there’s no opt-out. . . . There’s still dedicated funding. It gives more flexibility to the states as to how they will use that funding… It’s flexibility for the states within the transportation enhancements program.”

Clearly, Boxer is in a tight spot, having to placate some of the most conservative members of the Senate while also satisfying the active transportation advocates, in her state and around the country, who have held her feet to the fire on saving dedicated funds for bike/ped programs.

Streetsblog could not reach the EPW Committee or Coburn’s staff for comment before this story was posted, but we’ll update it if we hear more about exactly what was decided. It may just be a shuffling around of programs, with the essentials of bike/ped dedicated funding maintained, just in a different form.

Coburn was under intense pressure from senators on both sides of the aisle yesterday who wanted to avoid a weekend session, as well as the partial shutdown of the aviation system and the furlough of thousands of workers.

State DOTs and the transportation construction industry have been urging Congress for two years now to pass a long-term bill to restore some certainty to the business. They say the constant extensions create a chilling effect on new projects. Still, given the looming possibility of no extension at all, they are welcoming the six-month extension at current funding levels.

Voting against the extension last night were some of the most conservative members of the Senate. In addition to Sen. Coburn, Jim DeMint (R-SC), Ron Johnson (R-WI), Mike Lee (R-UT), Rand Paul (R-KY), and Pat Toomey (R-PA).

Sen. James Inhofe still wants to kill bike/ped funding — but later. Photo: TPM/wdcpix

And yesterday, as frazzled Senators rushed around the Capitol during their first day of legislative work after the August recess, the reality began to set in that the clock is ticking to pass an extension before the surface transportation programs expire on September 30.

In addition to passing the extension this morning, Boxer’s committee has also been crafting a two-year, $109 billion reauthorization that would keep spending at current levels.

Oklahoma Republican James Inhofe, the ranking member on the committee, voted for the clean four-month extension, saying it will buy the time needed to craft the two-year bill. He says he won’t support Sen. Tom Coburn’s push to kill transportation enhancement funding, which includes bicycle and pedestrian projects – for now. But when it comes to the two-year bill, Inhofe would like to say goodbye to all bike/ped projects.

“I’m all for totally cutting the transportation enhancement funding,” he said in an interview with Streetsblog. “I’ve talked to Senator Boxer about it and I think we can come up with something where we do away with those enhancements.”

Boxer has pledged to maintain dedicated funding for bicycle and pedestrian programs in the bill.

Inhofe did acknowledge, however, that TE comprises “less than 2 percent [of the transportation program], instead of the 10 percent that some people think it is.” (Coburn is one of those people.)

One of Chicago's celebrated new bicycling facilities, the Kinzie Street protected bike lane. Will any federal support for bike/ped projects remain after the next transpo bill passes? Photo: Josh Koonce/flickr

The outline confirms that the Senate is working on a two-year bill but does not include the dollar amount. “Consolidation” is the name of the game these days and the Senate plays along, making seven core surface transportation programs into five, including a new Transportation Mobility Program, which “sub-allocates” some funds to metropolitan areas, and a National Freight Program, which proponents of multi-modalism have long pushed for.

It preserves the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement Program, which has funded some bike and pedestrian projects. Transportation Enhancements, another major way such projects are funded, will probably now be absorbed under CMAQ. It’s unclear whether the Recreational Trails program would move to CMAQ as well. But there are no explicit guarantees to actually set aside funds for these bike-ped programs, and how funding levels will shake out in the final analysis is anybody’s guess.

Like the House, the Senate bill offers states “the flexibility to fund these activities as they see fit” – which amounts to a revocation of the federal commitment to funding this work. Many states, absent a federal mandate, will spend virtually nothing on bike/ped infrastructure.

Bicycling advocates had asked for dedicated funding that doesn’t pit them against road projects, the same funding proportion as they had in SAFETEA-LU, and changes to Safe Routes to School. None of those features appear to be in this bill.

“It’s hard to know without seeing the details, but at first blush it doesn’t look good for bike and pedestrian issues,” said Andy Clarke, president of the League of American Bicyclists. “Perhaps it’s to be expected that there’s nothing upfront in the language about protecting dedicated funding, given that it was a topic of some contention among the protagonists. But it’s pretty troubling to see no reference to any of the issues that affect cyclists and pedestrians – nothing about complete streets, nothing about dedicated funding.”

The Senate bill expands and modifies the TIFIA loan program, as does the House bill, and does not mention an infrastructure bank. Boxer indicated in the fall that she was more friendly to an expansion of TIFIA than to a new entity, though more recently she has said that she supported the inclusion of an infrastructure bank in the bill.

On performance outcomes, the outline says:

MAP-21 focuses the highway program on key outcomes, such as reducing fatalities, improving bridges, fixing roads, and reducing congestion, in order to ensure that taxpayers are receiving the most for their money. States will set their own targets for improving safety, road and bridge condition, congestion, and freight movement.

Probably one of the greatest disappointments in the bill – or at least this outline – is the omission of emissions reductions as one of those performance goals. To set that as a national priority would elevate the importance of transit and active transportation programs. The emphasis here rests squarely with roads.

“Improving bridges” and “fixing roads” don’t really sound like performance outcomes, and bicycling advocates fear that, while safety is an essential goal, the fact that there are about 60 times more car fatalities per year than bike fatalities will translate into a far greater focus on car safety than bicycle safety.

By contrast, the Bipartisan Policy Center has suggested setting national transportation goals such as economic growth, metropolitan accessibility, energy security and environmental protection.

The bill does seek to improve state and metro planning processes “to incorporate a more comprehensive performance-based approach to decision making.”

The Banking Committee has not yet inserted its transit language, nor has the Commerce Committee come forward with its rail language, so this outline doesn’t say anything about those elements.

We understand that the full bill has not even been circulated to Democratic committee members yet, indicating that, despite the false hopes of last week, a formal bill introduction is not yet on the horizon. The committee is holding a hearing this Thursday on “issues” for the reauthorization – a very general topic that would indicate that committee members are still gathering input, not debating an actual bill.

Sen. Barbara Boxer tells reporters nearly 500,000 construction jobs would be lost if the House cuts transportation funding. Photo: Alice Ollstein

Though she had initially pushed for a six-year bill, Boxer made it official that the EPW proposal is for a two-year bill that will only cover current funding levels plus inflation—about $109 billion over the two years. She said the Finance Committee is “very optimistic” that it can find the needed $6 billion per year in addition to the Highway Trust Fund revenues. There are “various ways to get there,” she said, but her preferred method is to redirect funds from the expensive wars abroad.

“We are now spending $12 billion a month in Iraq and Afghanistan,” she said. “We need $12 billion over two years. We are winding down those wars. It seems to me there’s a lot of funding available for this. It’s a very small amount compared to what we’re spending every month.”

At today’s press conference, Boxer focused mostly on the urgency of saving 500,000 construction sector jobs and 100,000 transit jobs, citing new Federal Highway Administration stats about the ramifications if Congress passes Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget, with its 30 percent cuts to transportation. Boxer’s aides pulled out charts detailing just how many jobs would be lost in each state, and Boxer pointed to the over 43,000 that her home state of California would shed.

“People just think you can say, ‘Oh, we’re going to cut 30 percent or 20 percent or 50 percent’ and they don’t really look at the ramifications,” she said. “Here are the ramifications: In my home state, 43,000 families would be devastated. And the nation’s bridges and highways are not going to be in any way considered safe, because with that tremendous cut we can’t do the things we need to do to keep up with our needs.”

As we reported recently, some criticize Boxer’s jobs-centric approach, since jobs are just a small part of the bill’s long-term boost to the economy, but jobs and unemployment are still the hot-button issues of the day, and clearly Boxer thinks it’s a winning issue.

As for the parts of the bill that the “Big Four” on the EPW Committee still need to iron out, Boxer wouldn’t give details, but said, “I think we’re getting extremely close. I don’t see any major disagreements at all.” She declined to comment on either an Infrastructure Bank or guaranteed federal funding for bike/ped projects, but confirmed that there will be no earmarks allowed.

“This is a very strong priority for the nation—you can’t be a great economic power without investing in infrastructure,” she said.

Rep. John Mica (R-FL), chair of the House Transportation Committee, will unveil his bill tomorrow, but whether it will get marked up – or even formally introduced — before the August recess is still up in the air. Boxer says her bill will be marked up “in a couple of weeks.”

The Oklahoma River trails: 13 miles of uninterrupted multi-use paths in Sen. James Inhofe's home state. Photo: flickr/tomfs

Some advocates doubted she was speaking for all members of the committee, especially ranking Republican James Inhofe of Oklahoma, who has repeatedly attacked bicycle funding and other transportation enhancement projects as wasteful and inappropriate recipients of federal money.

Those skeptics appear to be right. A Tulsa newspaper reported earlier this week:

Differences also cropped up between [Boxer and Inhofe] on projects such as bike paths and walkways.

Boxer said all modes of transportation should be covered, while Inhofe made it clear the committee should keep its focus on projects such as bridges and highways.

“She was not speaking for me,” he said.

Committee staff had followed up Boxer’s comments with a disclaimer that the bike/ped section was still being written, though they didn’t overtly dispute her assertion that active transportation funding would be preserved in the bill. They won’t give any further comment since the issues are still under negotiation.

“We hope the federal government will continue strongly investing in safer and more livable streets,” said Michael Murphy of Transportation Alternatives. “We don’t think that street safety is a partisan issue and we hope it won’t become one.”

Boxer likes to say that although she’s one of the most liberal members of the Senate and Inhofe is one of the most conservative, on issues of infrastructure investment, they see “eye to eye.” However, in the course of EPW hearings on the issue, serious differences have cropped up, especially over active transportation funding.

Advocates have worried at times that Boxer was so enamored of the idea that transportation is one issue she and her ranking member agreed on that perhaps she wouldn’t fight hard over their differences.

It appears that finding bipartisan consensus, even on the issues the committee has now managed to find agreement on, has been difficult and frustrating, implying that there are still many issues that divide them. Boxer will have to continue to fight for healthy transportation alternatives for her constituents in California and around the country.

Barbara Boxer said dedicated bicycle and pedestrian funding will still have a place in the federal transportation bill. Photo: Planetizen

Rather than holding funding at SAFETEA-LU levels, as we previously reported and as the EPW statement indicated, the committee is planning a $339.2 billion bill – current spending plus inflation, plus an expanded TIFIA loan program. That’s $56.5 billion a year. Boxer said the Senate bill would guarantee funding for bicycle and pedestrian programs, which had been in doubt.

TIFIA is currently funded at $110 million a year but demand has far outstripped the availability of loans. Boxer’s committee is proposing to increase that funding nine-fold, to $1 billion a year. She says that amount could leverage $30 billion a year in private investment. They also plan to increase the maximum federal share from 33 percent to 49 percent, with even more favorable terms for rural areas. The TIFIA program will keep its name but be folded into a new, larger program called America Fast Forward.

She’s still leaving open the option of an infrastructure bank, which she says she supports, but she’s always prioritized an expanded TIFIA program over an I-bank, mostly because she believes a program that already exists makes more sense than a brand new one.

Boxer said that including the $30 billion she hopes TIFIA will be able to leverage each year brings the bill over $500 billion – close to the administration figure. (Of course, the administration had leveraging mechanisms in its bill as well, notably the infrastructure bank, and didn’t include the private investment “leveraged” by those entities in its final number.)

She said her committee told the administration, “If you can show us the money, we’re happy to look at it,” but that “right now there isn’t any, so we’re going with what we think we can get through the United States Senate.”

Rep. John Mica, chair of the House Transportation Committee, has “different pressures,” Boxer said, including a House that has voted to use transportation funds for other purposes, but she added that they’re working closely together on the bill.

Boxer is “hoping for a six-year bill” but acknowledged that “we may not wind up with a six-year bill.” Still, she said that while a two-year option was very much “in the mix,” the committee wants the policy changes they make to take effect for six years. According to Boxer’s staff, if they pass this bill as a six-year bill, there will be a $12 billion shortfall every year as compared to Highway Trust Fund revenues. As a two-year bill, there’s a $6 billion annual shortfall. The committee is open to general fund transfers to fill that gap. The bill could also be three, four, or five years, of course, though those options are rarely mentioned.

Advocates for bicycle and pedestrian projects have been nervous about talk of “consolidating wasteful programs,” as Republicans on the committee have long let it be known that they consider bike/ped projects to be “wasteful.” Boxer made it clear that she disagrees (though she does agree that other “enhancements” like museums don’t belong in the transportation bill). “Certainly any mode of transportation – roads that support alternatives such as bike paths, walkways – will be included and get good attention,” she said, adding that they plan to continue to guarantee federal funds for these programs, not just leave it up to the states (though that part is not yet finalized).

She reiterated her support for indexing the gas tax to inflation but quickly discarded it as a non-starter – and besides, the question of how to pay for the bill is the jurisdiction of the Finance Committee, which will be looking for ways to make it viable. The chair of the Finance Committee, Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) is one of the “Big Four” of the EPW Committee who has agreed to the current principles, so that’s a good start.

“We’re ready to rock and roll,” said Boxer. The committee plans to start hearings on the final draft of the bill in two weeks and mark it up before the July 4 recess, meaning they would finalize the bill and send it to the full Senate for approval. She said Majority Leader Harry Reid is “elated” that the four major committee members have found bipartisan agreement on such substantial elements of the bill, which staff members say is already 150 pages long (though not in standard legislative formatting).

The Banking Committee, which has jurisdiction over transit, and Commerce, with control over rail, haven’t written their pieces of the bill yet. So far, we expect the highway/transit split to remain 80 percent/20 percent. Expect the debate over high-speed rail in the Commerce Committee to be intense.

Bike and pedestrian advocates are urging supporters to contact Senator Barbara Boxer today to tell her to retain dedicated funding for active transportation in the Senate transportation bill. Photo: CNN Politics

Advocates are rallying supporters to contact Committee Chair Barbara Boxer (D-California), and urge her and other senators to retain federal funding for bike and pedestrian programs.

Jeffrey Miller, president of the Alliance for Biking and Walking, says this marks an urgent opportunity to preserve funding for those important programs. “Senator Boxer is frankly our last hope,” said Miller. “If we don’t act now, dedicated funding for biking and walking programs may be written out of our transportation system for the next six years.”

The Senate occupies the key middle ground between the House GOP and the White House. House Transportation Chair John Mica (R-Florida) has indicated his desire to eliminate the federal commitment to bike-ped funding. While the Obama administration has repeatedly signaled its support for bike-ped programs under the banner of livability, if dedicated funding for bike and pedestrian projects isn’t preserved in the Senate version of the bill, there is little hope that they will reemerge in the conference committee process and get into the final bill, Miller said.

Biking and walking advocates are concerned that Boxer, who has generally been supporter, is being pressured to compromise and eliminate the programs, said Miller. Both the Alliance and the League of American Bicyclists are calling on their members to email Boxer, thank her for her past support and urge her to continue federal support for bicycle and pedestrian programs.

“At this very moment, she is negotiating with other senators who don’t think bicycling and walking are an important part of the transportation bill,” said Miller. “She needs to know we have her back on this issue and she shouldn’t give up on these crucial programs.”

“Transportation Enhancements, Safety Routes to School, and Recreational Trails are important programs for transportation, safety, and health that have a huge impact on the funding available for bicycling and walking projects,” said Bike League director Andy Clarke. “It is critical that these programs are included in the Senate draft. Otherwise, it will be nearly impossible to add them later in the process.”

Senators Chuck Schumer and Barbara Boxer on the return leg of their journey this morning. Photo: Carly Clark

Senator Chuck Schumer broke his long public silence on the redesigned Prospect Park West in dramatic fashion this morning, leading members of Congress on a two-wheeled tour of the physically separated bike lane that runs past his Brooklyn home. Schumer used the occasion to announce that he’ll be introducing new legislation to promote investment in bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure.

“I’ve been getting a lot of questions about this bike lane, and I just wanted to wait until this moment to say, ‘What’s not to like?’” Schumer told a press gaggle at Grand Army Plaza. “There’s much less speeding and more people feel safer riding their bikes to get around the neighborhood thanks to this new design. America needs more streets like this.”

Schumer’s bill, the Livable Streets Act of 2011, would make $3 billion available to states and cities each year for investment in walkable street networks and improvements to bicycle and pedestrian safety. The bill is intended to be part of the upcoming long-term reauthorization of the nation’s transportation law.

At the presser, Schumer was joined by California Democrat Barbara Boxer, who chairs the Environment and Public Works Committee and will shepherd much of the transportation bill through the Senate. Schumer said he’s been waiting since the redesign was installed last summer to show it to Boxer as an example of what bicycle and pedestrian investment can accomplish.

“Nothing beats a nice, long Brooklyn bike ride with my friends from Congress, but it used to scare them to death getting passed on this street by traffic going 40 miles an hour,” he said after leading a leisurely round-trip ride, in a light drizzle, to the opposite end of the bike lane and back. “Now you can start off comfortable and relaxed, and you see so many other people out biking. They’re going to work, they’re taking their kids to school.”

“You know, the President talked about ‘winning the future’ in his state of the union speech this year,” he added. “Well, we’re winning the future right outside my front door. This is what progress looks like.”

After the ride, Boxer said she looked forward to working with Schumer on incorporating his legislation into the final transportation bill. “You really get incredible bang for the buck out of projects like this, which make a whole lot of sense when you consider that 40 percent of all the trips we make in America are within two miles of home,” she said. “Factor in what you save from having fewer crashes and injuries and less wear-and-tear on the roads, and this is going to pay for itself.”

Invoking his policy muses, the imaginary Massapequa couple he calls the Baileys, Schumer noted that smarter zoning and safer streets could make bicycling a viable transportation option even if you have creaky knees and live in the suburbs. “These days the Baileys are getting squeezed at the pump,” he said. “Gas costs $4 a gallon. They can’t afford to make every trip by car. If we think we can drill our way out of this situation like Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, and the other extremists who get marching orders from Big Oil, we’re kidding ourselves. We need better choices for getting around, and transit and bikes have got to be part of the mix.”

When asked about the lawsuit filed last month by opponents of the bike lane, Schumer defended NYC DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan and called the plaintiffs’ campaign against the redesign “a cynical concoction of distortions and lies.”

“Janette is taking it on the chin from what I call the culture of inertia, this small group of self-appointed people,” he said. “Here we have kids, families, and grandmas who finally feel safe biking on this street, and people want to sue it out of existence? We can’t give in to this shameless bullying. If we do not change, we will die.”

From left: Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue, Mesa Mayor Scott Smith, Rep. John Mica, LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Sen. Barbara Boxer, AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka. Photo: Senate Photographic Studio

The “Tom and Rich Show” continued on Capitol Hill yesterday. Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue and AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka joined up for yet another event to show that business and labor, which don’t agree on anything, agree on a major infusion of federal investment for infrastructure.

They weren’t the only strange bedfellows there. Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer and Republican Congressman John Mica were practically holding hands through the entire press conference. Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa (a Democrat) found common cause with Mesa Mayor Scott Smith (a Republican).

“We have Democrats, Republicans, House, Senate, labor, business, lambs, lions, cats, dogs lying down together,” said Mayor Smith. “But there’s no apocalypse on the horizon. There’s a new dawn.”

In the past, even as other leaders in Boxer’s party have called for an infrastructure bank, she has hesitated to join them, expressing support for a strengthened and expanded TIFIA loan program instead. She’s said that rather than create a new federal bureaucracy, she’d rather stick with an existing program with a proven track record. But now she’s saying those approaches can each work in conjunction. “They’re definitely complementary,” she said yesterday. “I’m supporting the infrastructure bank, a strengthened TIFIA, and the Wyden approach [to renew the Build America Bonds program]. They’re all complementary. It’s all about leverage, leverage, leverage.”

Tom Donohue’s persistent, at times strident calls for strong federal infrastructure investment have been at odds with the calls from the fiscal conservatives the Chamber helped elect. While many in the House are bracing for a smaller reauthorization bill than hoped for – possibly even smaller than the last one, passed in 2005 – and calling for increased public-private partnerships to pick up the slack, Donohue knows that’s not going to cut it. He’s calling for a big bill, funded with a significant increase in the gas tax, which everyone in the transportation industry supports and everyone in Washington shuns.

Chamber spokesperson Janet Kavinoky explained why public-private partnerships can’t just replace adequate federal investment.

“You have to have revenue to do transportation projects,” she said. “So even if you’re doing public-private partnerships, even if you’re offering leveraging tools, you still have to have revenue to pay interest on debt and to pay returns on equity. That’s true if you take out a mortgage, it’s true if you have a credit card, it’s true if you do infrastructure. So we don’t want people to lose sight of the fact that public private partnerships, TIFIA, banks aren’t a magic solution for everything. We still gotta have the money.”

The unlikely allies came together yesterday to promote a new initiative they’re calling America Fast Forward, a new plan building on L.A.’s proposed 30/10 program to use targeted federal investments to leverage locally-raised money for transportation projects. They say it will create jobs, support business, and empower local communities without adding to the nation’s deficit.

As part of this, more than 100 mayors from around the country, including Smith and Villaraigosa, sent a letter last week to the chairs and ranking members of four of the main Congressional committees that will be crafting the transportation bill. The letter asks them to support an expanded TIFIA loan program to provide “credit assistance for surface transportation projects of national and regional significance” as well as Qualified Transportation Improvement Bonds, which the federal government subsidizes by paying most or all of the interest cost in the form of tax credits for investors.

Congress members and and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa take questions from the media. John Mica is at the podium flanked by Villaraigosa and Barbara Boxer. Photo: Darrell Clarke

Goodbye “30/10″ and hello “Fast Forward America.”

Congressman John Mica (R-FL) and Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) brought their road show to Los Angeles earlier this week to get feedback and elicit testimony on how to improve the federal transportation bill. While Boxer was on her “home turf,” it was Mica who sounded like a local, finding time to complain about traffic, needle Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa about transit connections to LAX, and repeatedly honor Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA), who was attending her last public event as a member of Congress.

While there was some talk of the need to better move freight through the Southland, much of the conversation was dominated by ways to expedite project delivery of all sorts. There was no talk of America’s obesity epidemic, rebuilding our cities and communities or even a mention of the words “bicycle” or “pedestrian.” The focus was almost completely on transit and goods movement.

Back in 2008, as soon as Los Angeles County passed a half-cent sales tax dedicated toward expanding its transportation network, the question was asked, “when are we going to start seeing projects on the ground?” Thanks to some innovations from the Move L.A. Coalition and the support of the Los Angeles Mayor’s office, the 30/10 Initiative was born. The plan was to leverage the funds that would be collected over the thirty-year sales tax to build the transit projects within the next ten years. By borrowing the money from the federal government up front, projects would be delivered sooner, taking advantage of today’s low construction costs and creating 160,000 construction jobs when the industry needs it most.

Because the plan would require some changes to federal law, there had always been some discussion of how these changes would help communities outside of Southern California. Today, Mayor Villaraigosa re-branded the 30/10 Initiative as a national initiative focused on putting more construction workers to work on more projects through what he’s calling “America Fast Forward.”

Mica and Boxer share a moment. Jane Harman prays.

America Fast Forward is a program that would leverage the funds created through local sales and gas taxes dedicated for transportation with low interest federal loans to jump start projects that already have “49%” of the project paid for at the local level. The program has received the support of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the AFL-CIO, and over 60 Mayors from around the country. In his testimony, Villaraigosa described the changes in federal transportation financing that would make America Fast Forward possible. In particular, he called for the expanson of the Transportation and Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA).

Villraigosa called for nearly tripling the TIFIA Budget to at least $350 million annually. Later in the hearing, Boxer commented that even the $350 million number was low prompting Villaraigosa to say that he would support as high a number as he could get. As well, American Fast Forward calls for:

• Increasing the maximum percentage of the project allotment that TIFIA can fund. Currently, TIFIA will fund up to 80% of a project with no “added points” going towards proposal with a higher local match. Villaraigosa called for at least a 49% local match;
• Permitting the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) to approve multiple related projects at the same time. In Los Angeles County, for example, this could mean loans for the entire suite of Measure R transit projects at once, as opposed to a line-by-line piecemeal approach;
• Allowing USDOT to grant up-front credits to projects and;
• Authorizing USDOT to lock-in interest rates for approved projects.

“This is not an earmark, it is a template,” finished Villaraigosa, who noted throughout his presentation that this model would help the communities that have voted to help themselves.

Don Knabe, the Board Chair for The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority (Metro), made the case that federal investment in communities that invest in themselves is a long-overdue idea. “Every time we go to Washington, the feds tell us to come back with a funding source. The voters of this county have voted to tax themselves three times in the last three decades. Yet, we are not awarded for the leadership that this agency has shown nor the leadership our voters have shown.”

Also backing Villaraigosa and Knabe were key representatives of business and labor, respectively, Mr. Joseph A. Czyzyk, Chair of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, and Mr. Robbie Hunter, Council Representative, Los Angeles/Orange Counties Building & Construction Trades Council.

Across the “Orange Curtain” they have a different program to speed up project delivery. Will Kempton, now the Director of the Orange County Transit Authority outlined their program for project expedition, the “Breaking Down Barriers Initiative.” While Kempton promised a written testimony that would cover two dozen suggestions, for today’s hearing he outlined four needs to bring projects to fruition more quickly.

• Extend and expand National Environmental Protection Act delegation to states, allowing those with strong environmental regulation to do their own environmental reviews only once, instead of an additional parallel federal review.
• Streamline the federal funding process.
• Overlap activities that can be overlapped.
• Work with environmental community to streamline permitting.

Of these, expanding the “NEPA Delegation Pilot Program” seems the most promising. Because California’s environmental review law, CEQA, is more stringent than NEPA, California can grant both CEQA and NEPA permits at the same time. Kempton estimated this cuts between 10 and 14 months off the life of a project.

Much of the discussion on freight was about how to move freight more efficiently. Both Knabe and Congress Woman Laura Richardson represent the areas surrounding the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach and both were looking for answers on ways to move freight better. Catherine Philips, from the Environmental Defense Fund, congratulated the Ports on their clean air initiatives. However, no panelists offered specific proposals for how to move freight through Los Angeles better. That said, Rep. Bill Shuster (R-Penn.) noted that 40% of goods that arrive through L.A.’s ports end up east of the Mississippi River, so goods movement in Los Angeles should be a national priority.

As touched on earlier, the complete lack of any discussion about urban mobility in the form of creating better communities, creating walkable and bikeable streets and just encouraging options to the automobile was jarring. Los Angeles is in the early stages of a Livable Streets renaissance, with a progressive bike plan and news of the My Figueroa project dominating the local Streetsblog in 2011. The only thing that L.A. needs is a true funding commitment to create sustainable urban communities, but today talk of that commitment was nowhere to be found.

At an EPW hearing last month, a witness told Senators that to visualize the number of unemployed construction workers, they should picture the Dallas Cowboys stadium, which seats 100,000 people -- times 20. That point hit home with Sen. Boxer. Today, she helped her fellow Senators with the visual. Photo courtesy of the Senate EPW Committee.

Against all odds, in a time of high unemployment and Republican attacks on spending, momentum may finally be building for a gas tax increase.

Business and labor came together to make a rare show of unity today to push for a robust transportation reauthorization with adequate investment for infrastructure. And they spoke out loud and clear for a higher gas tax. Most surprising of all – it seemed that Senators were finally ready to have a mature discussion about it.

The gas tax has been a third rail issue lately. While finance and infrastructure experts roundly agree on the need to raise the tax – which hasn’t been increased since 1993 and whose purchasing power has been gutted by inflation and improved fuel efficiency – politicians have been unwilling to get behind a tax hike during a down economy.

Enter Tom Donohue and Richard Trumka, two towering figures in U.S. economic life. Donohue, the cantankerous chief of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Trumka, the man’s man who heads the AFL-CIO, don’t agree on much. In fact, a favorite joke of today’s Senate hearing, where the two appeared together, centered on the strange-bedfellow nature of their joint push for infrastructure investment.

“The fact that Tom Donohue and I appear before you today does not mean that hell has frozen over or unicorns are now roaming the land,” Trumka joked in his opening statement at the Environment and Public Works Committee hearing. Delaware Democrat Tom Carper interjected, “When I walked up here from the train station this morning I did see a pig fly overhead.”

Carper noted that he was one of the only people on the Hill willing to support a modest increase in the gas tax to pay for infrastructure and deficit reduction. He has suggested raising it a penny a month for 25 months. The deficit commission has moderated that proposal, recommending a penny a quarter for three and a half years (resulting in a 15-cent increase), with all of the revenues going to infrastructure.

Think about it – a 15-cent increase in three and a half years. I’ve seen three and a half months where we’ve seen gas prices go up – or down – by that much. I’ve seen three and a half weeks – and we all have – where they’ve gone up by that much. So I would ask you, in spirit of ‘the things worth having are worth paying for,’ to keep that in mind and help find a way to make this acceptable to the folks in our country.

Rich Trumka agreed. He said all funding and financing options should be on the table, from a stronger TIFIA loan program to a reauthorization of the Build America Bonds to an infrastructure bank. He proposed a half-cent tax on financial transactions, saying Wall Street created a mess that taxpayers are still paying for. (He and Donohue part ways on this particular recommendation.)

But in the end, Trumka said none of that will generate the robust funding at the level that’s needed.

We must rely on and boost our user fee revenue streams, a key component in addressing our huge infrastructure deficit. The gas tax has not been raised since 1993. It provides diminishing levels of funding and should be raised. Other forms of user fee funding mechanisms such as creating a user fee based on vehicle miles traveled have been discussed.

He cautioned that user fees can “have an unfair and disproportionate impact on working people if not properly designed” and threw in a pitch for collective bargaining rights, saying that when people earn a decent living they don’t “squeak” at paying a higher gas tax.

And Trumka also noted that federal investment was key because, despite all the talk of public-private partnerships, especially by House Transportation Committee Chair John Mica, “Private capital has never and will never adequately invest in public infrastructure because private investors cannot capture the economic gains that infrastructure creates.”

Well, sure, you might be thinking – the tax-and-spend liberals in the AFL-CIO might get behind a gas tax but the big-business conservatives of the Chamber of Commerce will never go for it, right? Wrong.

“We’ve been doing this since Dwight Eisenhower,” Donohue said. “If you’ve got another way, I’m glad to hear about it. I haven’t seen it.”

Donohue was president and CEO of the American Trucking Associations for 13 years. He says back then, California truckers resented paying a user fee that would be used to build roads in Nevada, but he told them, “you have to build roads in Las Vegas or you’ll never get out of California.” These days, truckers are begging for a hike in the diesel tax if it would mean that the country would repair its roads and reduce traffic.

The brainstorm continued. Sen. Barbara Boxer asked about a fee on shipping containers entering the country at customs. Donohue shot that one down as fast as he shot down the financial transaction fee idea, saying exporters would find ways around the fee and might slap a tariff on U.S. goods in retaliation.

That left Boxer with the stone-cold realization that the answer, really, was the gas tax. Yes, Donohue said. It’s just common sense, “recognizing that you’re collecting half of what you used to.” Boxer added that people driving electric cars aren’t paying anything for the roads, and started mulling the VMT fee.

“I don’t like the idea of putting some ‘spy thing’ in people’s cars,” Boxer said. “I would do it on an honest basis where every year you pay registration and you pay a fee for vehicle miles traveled.” And she echoed Donohue’s point, which she admitted she hadn’t thought about before, that “we have system in place and to create new system is controversial and we don’t know the consequences.”

The hearing involved some of the usual bickering over bike lanes and transit – the “hitchhikers” onto a Highway Trust Fund intended just for highways, to hear Ranking Member James Inhofe (R-OK) tell it. Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD) reminded him that public transportation investment actually creates more jobs than roads and attracts development near transit stops.

Trumka and Donohue refused to get dragged into that debate, asserting that roads and rails are both necessary to create jobs, reduce congestion, and build a 21^st century infrastructure.

Barbara Boxer will play a key role in the passage of any long-term transportation bill. Yesterday she expressed her support. Image: Politico

In a statement to the press, Boxer praised the White House’s proposal, promising to work to build bipartisan support:

While I may not agree with everything in it, the President’s budget reflects the need to cut the deficit in a responsible way. It stands in sharp contrast to the Republicans’ budget, which is so extreme that it would jeopardize our fragile economic recovery.

I commend the President for his investment in transportation, which will create and save millions of jobs and ensure that our country can compete in the 21^st century. I’ve already begun reaching across the aisle to build support for a robust surface transportation bill that will accelerate our economic recovery and build the foundation for long-term prosperity.

Since its release yesterday, the Obama administration’s six-year, $556 billion transportation plan has sparked questions about its viability in a Congress where the Republican-controlled House has promised draconian spending cuts. And it didn’t take long for the House GOP leadership to blast the transportation plan.

The support of a key Senate committee chair, however, is an encouraging early sign in what is likely to be a long and tortuous road to adoption.

Photo from Zagasi

Before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee even has all its members named (that should happen in the next day or so, according to Sen. Boxer), it held a hearing to get the ball rolling on a new transportation bill.

“China is building railroads that will be going hundreds of miles an hour,” said Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), “while America retreats more towards the rickshaw.”

Top committee Republican James Inhofe is all in favor of a big infrastructure bill, but his brand of support includes limiting the scope of the bill. “Our problem in getting the bill we need to get is really not as much the Democrats as it is the Republicans,” he acknowledged. “‘Cause I can hear it right now. They will get it to the floor and say, wait a minute, we’ve got museums in here and these other things.”

Later he clarified that “these other things” are “state capitol domes and bike trails,” which let loose a flurry of trash-talking about bike trails. “I wasn’t aware there were things in the infrastructure bill that aren’t real infrastructure,” said Raymond Poupore of the National Construction Alliance, who was testifying before the committee. “I always thought it was just highways.” And Bill Dorey of the Associated General Contractors of America added, “It’s hard for me to defend a bike path.”

Inhofe suggested that getting back to a meat-and-potatoes highway bill was the key to Republican support. “The best way I can get the full cooperation of the Republicans is if we took this back to the way it was originally, when we had the highway trust fund and the people who paid to use our highways would confine it to maintenance, new construction, bridges, highways then that would be sellable to the conservative community,” he said.

Some Democrats did rush to cyclists’ defense. Boxer herself let it be known that “to me, a bike path is a way of transport; a lot of my people use it to get to work.”

And Maryland Democrat Ben Cardin “took issue” with Inhofe’s dismissal of transportation enhancements. “We need to look at multimodal transportation. Yes, the overwhelming amount of dollars that are reauthorized are going to be for the traditional types of transportation, whether they be roads or bridges or conventional transit. But we need to look at smarter ways,” he said. Baltimore’s designer, he said, tried to connect communities through greenspace.

We’re looking at ways of trying to connect communities again so they don’t have to use our roads! So we don’t have to build so many roads! To me, that saves money in our transportation! And it’s the right investement for our nation. Every dollar that we authorize needs to be spent efficiently and appropriately for transportation in this country. But let us not be afraid to look at alternative ways that can save money, create jobs, and then have more dollars available for the expensive projects that we know we need to build such as high speed rail.

Other Democrats, while not exactly taking up the bike trail issue, declared their love of asphalt. Montana Senator Max Baucus, who chairs the Finance Committee and sits on EPW, celebrated the fact that Montana has more highway miles per capita than any other state. “We love our highways,” he said.

Another theme that came up was the possibility of selling infrastructure investment as a jobs bill for veterans. Susan Martinovich of the Nevada DOT and AASHTO said the unemployment crisis in the construction sector hits home for her on a personal level. “My son is a sergeant in the US Marine Corps, recovering from serious wounds,” she told the committee. “He and many of his fellow Marines spent time in Afghanistan building infrastructure. Transportation is an industry that could provide jobs for these warriors. And they’re jobs that they’re skilled to undertake, but they’re not assured to be there.”

Sen. Boxer was intrigued by the idea. Poupore added that his organization has a Helmets to Hard Hats program that could be a model. Look for more talk of this in the future.

Photo from Barbara Boxer's flickr page

But she also said that the future of any transportation bill is in jeopardy now that the House has passed a new rule allowing money to languish in the highway trust fund instead of being spent on urgent infrastructure projects. The Republicans want to keep that money in the bank in the name of deficit reduction.

Boxer made it clear that if there’s no mandate to spend the money in the highway trust fund, “there is no highway trust fund.” She called the fund “sacrosanct” and made it clear that the new rule makes it far more difficult to craft a serious transportation bill, since financing will no longer be guaranteed. “If the Republicans plan to raid this fund,” she said, “then all of our plans to do more, to do it right, to do it better – even to do as much as we’ve done before – are thrown aside.”

She said the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will be holding its first hearing on the transportation bill January 26. The hearing isn’t on the committee’s website yet, but it’s on our calendar now. She reaffirmed that she and Senator James Inhofe, the top Republican on her committee, see eye to eye on infrastructure (though they don’t quite agree on climate science). “I’m hopeful we’ll be able to be a unified force,” she said.

She called the press conference to affirm that the EPW Committee, which she chairs, will continue working to protect the environment – specifically, against attacks on environmental regulation. She railed against Rep. Fred Upton’s recent statement, “We are not going to let this administration regulate what they’ve been unable to legislate,” referring to the EPA’s regulation of greenhouse gases as any other pollutant.

Boxer made it clear that not only does clean air legislation require such regulation, the Supreme Court has mandated it. Even the auto industry supports it: Boxer pointed out that the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers favors EPA regulation of carbon and raising fuel economy standards.

As for a climate bill, Boxer said one would surface when it has the votes. Even with a stronger Democratic majority in the Senate, they could never muster more than 54 votes for it – not enough to overcome a filibuster.

So does that mean Sen. Boxer is in favor of the new proposal to reform the filibuster rule so that not every piece of important legislation stalls without a 60-vote super-majority? She does indeed. Expect to see her listed as a co-sponsor soon.

The Senate has run out of time. The three days are up today. And the upper chamber isn’t planning on going along with the House’s idea of extending the current budget (with a few tweaks) till September 30. Instead, the Senate is planning to vote today to extend it just until March 4.

The House will vote on whatever the Senate passes quickly. Though a short extension wasn’t what the House wanted, sources say lawmakers are ready to take what they can get and go home for Christmas already.

A shorter extension means the Republican House will be able to craft their own budget sooner — albeit for only half a year. Same goes for the transportation reauthorization. They won’t have a year (really nine months now) to wait anymore. Once the new Congress gets seated in January, they’ll have to put their noses to the grindstone. The Republicans have given some indication as to what a new GOP-written transpo bill might look like, and it’s not quite what we were going to get from Jim Oberstar.

Will we see a new six-year reauthorization pass that early? Unlikely. Robert Puentes at the Brookings Institution is hoping they’ll pass a two-year reauthorization to get us out of the cycle of endless extensions.

We mentioned last week that we’re looking forward to Senator Barbara Boxer stepping up as a leader for transportation reauthorization and reform. A quicker timeline on the debate over transportation funding makes it even more critical that advocates can count on her as a champion for positive change.

A $50.5 million TIFIA loan helped finance the largest public works project ever undertaken in Northern Nevada, the Reno Transportation Rail Access Corridor. Image courtesy of the city of Reno

Robert Puentes of the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program says the current system is “both broke and broken,” meaning dramatic changes to the financing system are essential to get the kind of transportation system we want. “Minor tweaks are just not going to be enough,” he said. “You could triple the bike program and that’s great, but it’s not going to solve the major challenges we’re facing as a nation. It’s all got to be run through an economic lens.”

Puentes favors a National Infrastructure Bank, promoted by President Obama in his Labor Day speech, as a way to channel transportation investments strategically.

One person who will have a large role in shaping an infrastructure bank is California Senator Barbara Boxer, chair of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. In a hearing this fall, Boxer challenged the idea of a National Infrastructure Bank, saying she’d prefer to see current financing programs strengthened. The program that Boxer wanted to see strengthened, instead of establishing a NIB, is known as TIFIA (Transportation Infrastructure Finance & Innovation Act).

So, you’re probably wondering whether using TIFIA or a NIB to pay for infrastructure makes a difference. Is one mechanism better suited to building a safer, more efficient, and sustainable transportation system than the other?

TIFIA

TIFIA is a program of the Federal Highway Administration that provides credit assistance – not grants – for infrastructure projects. It doesn’t substitute for public spending or private investment – it’s a way to encourage private investment by providing loan security.

TIFIA has been around since 1998 but it’s come into greater use since the recession started eating away at state budgets. “They didn’t need it [before the recession] the same way they need it today,” says Puentes. “It’s oversubscribed, and so we need to figure out a way to choose TIFIA projects based on their merits.”

It’s not clear how the TIFIA program chooses projects to support, now that applications outnumber availability by a factor of more than eight to one. That’s one critique of the program: that it’s not transparent enough in its decision-making.

The U.S. DOT has a proposal for TIFIA reform [PDF], but it refers to technicalities like repayment schedules and wage laws. Reformers say more dramatic, substantive reform would need to happen to make TIFIA a lever for change.

And many doubt that TIFIA can be as strong as it needs to be as long as it’s housed in the Department of Transportation. “Once something is created in DOT or in Treasury or anywhere else, it becomes part of someone’s jurisdiction, someone’s fiefdom,” says Scott Thomasson, an expert in infrastructure finance at the Progressive Policy Institute. “And there are people who want control of it and are going to fight if you try to change it too much.”

But could TIFIA be made into an independent entity? “That’s an institutional political fight you’re going to lose,” says Thomasson, “if you try to take away somebody’s baby.”

In our next post, we’ll investigate the proposal to establish a National Infrastructure Bank, how it compares to TIFIA, and evaluate its pros and cons.

EPW Committee Chair Barbara Boxer says "not so fast" on a national infrastructure bank.

California Democrat Barbara Boxer, chair of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, expressed skepticism about one of the centerpieces of President Obama’s infrastructure plan today. As she tries to stave off an election challenge from the right, Boxer seems reluctant to embrace the creation of a national infrastructure bank to finance transportation projects.

In a committee hearing today, Boxer instead threw her weight behind an existing program created by the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA):

The infrastructure bank has some support in Congress, others oppose it. So the reason I focus on TIFIA is because it’s already there. So, I think the Administration, I hope, will recognize that if something is already in law it may be easier to go with that model. I’m not saying give up on the infrastructure bank…. But TIFIA is there.

Boxer also appeared to take solace in a statement from Senator James Inhofe, the ranking Republican on the Environment committee and well-known climate change skeptic. (He was at another hearing and couldn’t attend.) In his statement, Inhofe said TIFIA was one of the forms of “innovative financing I’m most excited about,” adding that “this is a successful program that must be dramatically expanded.”

Unlike TIFIA, the infrastructure bank has generated enthusiasm from transportation reformers, who see it as a potential vehicle to spur investment in walkable development.

The star of the hearing was Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. After his county voted to pay an extra half-cent sales tax to accelerate transit construction, Villaraigosa has become an outspoken advocate of federal financial assistance for local transportation projects, pushing specifically for his plan to accelerate transit investment in L.A. He acknowledged that whenever a jurisdiction asks for federal money for a project, officials will need to answer the question, “If it’s such a good idea, how much of your money are you putting up?”

Villaraigosa aligned with Boxer on the TIFIA vs. infrastructure bank question. When he identified his two-point financing wish-list, it included an expansion and modification of TIFIA and a new category of subsidized infrastructure bonds. He told Boxer, “As you said, while the infrastructure bank may be a good idea, these programs currently exist; they can be expanded in a way to move projects now.”

Boxer also found a willing partner in Roy Kienitz, the Under Secretary for Policy at DOT. She asked him if DOT would work with the committee to “reform TIFIA in such a way that it rewards those counties, cities, states that are willing” to help bear the funding burden themselves. His answer: “In a word, yes, we’re absolutely willing to do that.”

More on Kienitz’s statements in the next post.

Bicyclists in Philadelphia, where $23 million in TIGER money was awarded to build new trails. (Photo: BCGP)

"People at home really think they’re very good," Boxer said of the TIGER grants, seeking advice from deputy U.S. DOT secretary John Porcari on how to write the program into her forthcoming six-year transportation legislation.

TIGER, short for Transportation Investments Generating Economic Recovery, awarded $1.5 billion to infrastructure projects that best met a series of criteria set by the Obama administration, including economic growth potential and environmental benefits. Transportation reformers have hailed the program as a first step in creating a federal system that funds projects based on merit rather than state-by-state formulas.

Porcari echoed that praise, describing TIGER as "the way to the future in intermodal transportation," but offered few details on how the program might be enshrined in the long-term legislation being drafted by Boxer’s panel.